Terms Of Political Power Research Articles

Eleştiri ve Polemiğin Ötesinde: Çevrimiçi ve Dışı Kamusal Tartışmalar Üzerinden Bakım Etiğinin Sınırlarının Sorgulanması

This article investigates the state of public communication on and offline as a test case for the viability of care ethics to deal with the fundamental disagreements that characterize our communicative interactions. The argument proceeds in four steps. First, I adumbrate two styles of argumentation that I link with two influential modern ethical theories, the critical-deontological and the polemical-utilitarian. I claim that restricting ourselves to these four terms imprisons us to oscillations between two apparently incompatible frameworks that picture public communication either in normative terms or in terms of power politics. Second, I claim that care ethics offers promising conceptual and normative resources to overcome these oscillations between critique and polemic. Third, I show how this is the case because of the unique way in which care ethics seeks to overcome the opposition between dependence and independence by reconfiguring the standard picture of the separation between morality and politics. Finally, I claim that the real limitation of care ethics is not to be found in its lack of universalizable norms or precise standards, but rather in its insufficient questioning of the extent to which disagreement as dissensus might characterize contemporary politics.

THE ROLE OF THE NAVY IN SERVING THE SECURITY, PROSPERITY AND ORDER AT SEA: AN OVERVIEW OF THE INDO-PACIFIC CONSTRUCT

In the context of geostrategic discourse, the rise of the Indo-Pacific construct has often been discussed in terms of power politics. This paper argues that the IP does not necessarily mean excellent power competition but can also promote a progressive value in the global maritime domain, such as creating a rule-based order at sea, freedom of navigation, and maritime connectivity. In order to comprehend the argument, this paper studies the extent to which the Navy can work towards achieving these values, as the sea is the core business of navies around the world, both during peace and wartime. Specifically, this paper seeks to analyse the role and function of navies in serving the common interests of the IP and its commitment towards a purpose, security, prosperity, and order at sea, namely first, ensuring the safety and security of the sea lines of communication, second, building on regional and global maritime networks, and third, assisting humanitarian and disaster relief and search and rescue. This paper finds that the Navy plays a significant role, and all these aspects are inclusive and shared with states; as such, navies are to serve the interests of the commitment of the IP.

Orta Asya'nın Yapay Zeka Jeopolitiği: Rusya ve Çin Örnekleri

In the 21st century, the Artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies are increasingly transforming the instruments of power and contributing to intensifying rivalry on the dynamics of balance of power. In the context of the Central Asian geopolitics, China’s expanding AI technologies do not only serve for its economic growth and national power, but embody future areas of uncertainty in the Sino-Russian relations. Despite the current state of a kind of 'entente cordiale' over their role in the Central Asia, the future developments in the AI technologies can reinforce far-reaching repercussions in their relations. In this vein, this study analyzes the implications of AI technologies in terms of power politics and discusses the future of Sino-Russian relations in the Central Asian context. It addresses the possible utilization of AI technologies under the context of military, economic, and political areas and discusses possible consequences on the future of regional systemic dynamics. Consequently, the study argues that despite ongoing harmonious relations between the two power, the development and utilization of AI as a strategic asset in the Central Asian landscape can generate new areas of strategic competition and challenges for the future of Sino-Russian relations.

신라하대 實相山門의 禪師들

The activities of Silsangsanmun Zen monks in the Late Silla period have crucial meaning in the history of the Zen Buddhism. Hong cheok was one of the Zen monks in the period of accepting the Zen Buddhism and has been regarded as one of ‘the initial monks(初傳僧)’ along with Doui(道義) since then. Silsangsanmun was ‘the first Zen sect’ opened first among so-called Nine Zen sect. In particular, Hongcheok was a special Zen monk who achieved both the acceptance of the Zen Buddhism in Silla and the outset of Zen sect.
 Hyeonuk(玄昱, 787~868) was outset of Bongrimsanmun and returned a little later than the initial monks like Doui or Hongcheok to spread the Zen Buddhism widely. Returning about 10 years later than Hongcheok, he stayed in Silsang sa Temple for three years. Presumably, Hyeonuk’s stay in Salsangsa Temple did not mean the change of religious tradition in Zen sect but was attributed to Silla’s royal family devoting to it with the mediation of Hongcheok.
 After Hong cheok, Silsang sanmun was handed down to Sucheol(秀澈, 815~893) and Pyeonun(片雲, ?~910). Sucheol was the second progenitor of Silsangsanmun following Hongcheok and installed as the national monk of Silla after Hongcheok. Particularly, he had ties with Silla’s loyal family in the line of King Gyeongmun leading from King Gyeongmun to Queen Jinseong.
 About Pyeonun, research was done centering around prestigious writings on stupas. He competed with Sucheol about the main line of descent and was connected to the reign of Gyeonhwon in the Post Baekje in terms of political power. Sucheol and Pyeonun were the second-generation Zennists following Hongcheok. These two were the disciples under the same master, and they were combined with Silla and Post Baekje each, which well reveals severe competition developed around the world of Buddhists then.

Russland und das Selbstbestimmungsrecht der Völker im postsowjetischen Raum

As a concept of international law, the right to self-determination is widely renowned for its unclarity. Broadly speaking, one can differentiate between a liberal and a nationalist tradition. In modern international law, the balance between these two opposing traditions is sought in an attempt to contain or ‘domesticate’ the nationalist conception by limiting it to ‘abnormal’ situations, i.e. to colonialism in the sense of ‘alien subjugation, domination and exploitation’. Essentially, this distinction between ‘normal’ and ‘abnormal’ situations has since been the heart of the matter in the legal discourse on the right to self-determination, with the important qualification regarding the need to preserve existing borders. This study situates Russia’s approach to the right to self- determination in that discourse by way of a regional comparison vis-à-vis a ‘western’ or European perspective, and a temporal comparison with the former Soviet doctrine of international law. Against the background of the Soviet Union’s role in the evolution of the right to self-determination, the bulk of the study analyses Russia’s relevant state practice in the post-Soviet space through the prisms of sovereignty, secession, and annexation. Complemented by a review of the Russian scholarship on the topic, it is suggested that Russia’s approach to the right to self-determination may be best understood not only in terms of power politics disguised as legal rhetoric, but can be seen as evidence of traits of a regional (re-)fragmentation of international law.

A Lawyer's Guide to Lawless Action

A Lawyer's Guide to Lawless Action Sonali Chakravarti (bio) Jack Jackson. Law Without Future: Anti-Constitutional Politics and the American Right. Philadelphia: Penn Press, 2019. 200 pp. $45.00 (hb). ISBN: 9780812251333. Jack Jackson has written a powerful and memorable book about the precursors to and implications of the anti-constitutionalism championed by the Right; he acutely identifies legal phenomena many of us have been thinking about but have not been able to put into words. Drawing on the cases of Bush. v. Gore, the Torture Memos, and Terri Schiavo to understand legally justifiable decisions that are meant to offer no precedent, he writes, "Anti-constitutionalism rules without producing a new juridical norm or legal order but instead generates a show and shadow of legality that becomes the claimed basis of authority—law thus governs at the precise moment it withdraws. In this withdrawal, the temporal underpinnings of constitutional politics disappear: futurity evaporates (11)." With erudition and style, Jackson shows how Trump's legal interventions are a continuation of the long-standing strategy on the Right to ground politically expedient decisions in the law in unusual ways while circumventing much of what precedent and constitutional protections would require. Just as Mitch McConnell feared no reprisal from Democrats or his constituency when he refused to grant a hearing to Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland, the proponents of the anti-constitutionalism Jackson describes have no fear of being accused of hypocrisy or irresponsibility. The weakening of the law, norms, and precedent are of ultimately no concern to them when so much is at stake in terms of political power in the present. Anti-constitutionalism emerges as the dialectical result of the forces of legal realism and political nihilism and it finds its apotheosis in a legally codified apocalyptic vision. In Chapter Two on the Torture Memos (a chapter that I am eager to share with my students for the concise way it combines history and theory), Jack-son chronicles the futile effort of the left's appeal to the law in reaction to the [End Page 837] regime of terror inflicted on detainees at Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo and other sites with an appeal to the law, including appeals to domestic law and international human rights law. The irony of the situation, Jackson notes, is how much legal attention was already being paid to the matter—there were, literally and metaphorically, planes full of lawyers spending time at the sites and constructing a legal foundation for the regime. Ignoring the reality of the legal care that went into the Torture Memos distorts our understanding in two ways: (1) we remain blind to the legally sanctioned conditions of prisoners in the US prior to and existing after the Global War on Terror, and (2) we fail to see how the legal action in the case furthers the idea of the "constitutional zero," Jackson's term for a decision that is written in a way that both thwarts precedent and is not meant to generate precedent. Of the torture memo of August 1, 2002, he writes, "the spaces opened up and the practices set into motion by the memo tear asunder the constitutive bonds holding together the practice of law, but they are no means 'outlaw': They rule as law through the institutional from which they emerge (the OLC), the professional credentials of the authors (the elite sector of the profession), the form through which they communicate (the genre of the legal memorandum), and the power that they confer (the immunity they bestow upon the interrogators)." (52) His analysis is compelling and the reader experiences a feeling of satisfaction in making sense of a seemingly chaotic and distressing sequence of recent events. At the same time, the apocalyptic horizon of a "law without future" comes sharply into focus. His analysis also prompts the perennial question about the nature of justice as a struggle between the routinized and the exceptional case. While he does not grapple with it directly, the underlying thesis of the book is that there is a value to certain types of predictability, order, and promise-keeping in the law, but how can this be weighed against the value of the contextual...

The Structure and Internal Logic of the Economic Thoughts in Ancient China: A Case Study of Confucius in Terms of Political Power and Ethics

Recently, the research paradigm of the economic thoughts in ancient China mainly emphasizes the concepts in western mainline economics, such as market, exchange and division of labor, but ignores the other factors, like political power and morality. In that case, it is widely believed that the economic thoughts in ancient China are scattered and unstructured, which means there is no clear logical chain between the relevant concepts. However, political power is a vital consideration for economic problems in ancient China, and the moral concepts proposed by different schools in China are the foundation of economic analysis at that time. Then how could we understand these ideas more precisely and comprehensively, and how should we consider the difference in economic concepts between China and the West? Are there any unique and structured ideas in ancient China? To answer these urgent problems has certain significance to fully understand the economic thoughts in ancient China, and also can provide some enlightenment for revaluating those ideas.In a bid to deal with these problems, this paper would, as an example, analyze the economic thoughts of Confucius with a paradigm including the political and moral factors. First of all, we summarize the essential economic problems the society facing in the West-Zhou Dynasty and the Spring-Autumn Period, especially the problems about how the rulers having political power intervene in the institutional change. Then, according to the historical materials during these periods, we try to find out the measures ancient thinkers took to tackle the specific problems with moral concepts, and the whole progress in which they create an economy institution design. In the end, we analyze Confucius’ ideas about the morality and institutional design, and thereby try to summarize the basic structure and inner logic of the economic thoughts in ancient China.It comes to the following conclusions: Firstly, the core of Confucius’ economic thoughts is about how to deal with the economic problems with the discussion of moral concepts being prevalent during that period. His planning about economic institutions, such as the land system and tax system, is based on his argument for political legitimacy. Secondly, the basic structure of the economic thoughts in ancient China may include three considerations: the knowledge of sociopolitical and economic problems, the knowledge of social legitimacy in terms of morality, the design of economic institutions. Thirdly, there is a consistent logic in ancient economic thoughts. The discovery of objective facts including specific political and economic problems would influence the value judgment reflected by the change of moral concepts’ definition, and thereby these kinds of change in moral concepts would lead to a new institutional design.The conclusions of this paper provide some enlightenment for the study of ancient economic thoughts. We provide a new study paradigm of ancient economic thoughts, which include some neglected factors, such as political power, moral concepts and economic institutions. Except for Confucius, this paradigm can be also used in others’ economic thoughts in ancient time. What’s more, emphasizing the link between ancient economic thoughts and specific economic problems would be beneficial to understand the development of economy in modern society, like the moral issues caused by the development of market-oriented economy in China.In short, this paper provides a new angle of view to understand the economic thoughts in ancient China more precisely and comprehensively, compared with the previous study paradigm which follows Western mainstream economic theories. Additionally, it also deeply analyzes the important role of power and ethics in the formation and development of ancient economic thoughts and their internal relations, and on this basis gives the basic logic that the ancients followed in discussing economic issues.

Chinese maritime relations with Malabar Coast, 1200–1500 AD: A quest for naval dominance

ABSTRACTChina has had a long history of maritime expedition. Its Indian Ocean connectivity, long before European explorers arrived at the Malabar Coast, had made significant impact on the maritime trade in the Indian Ocean region. China’s expedition to the Southern Asia was aimed to expand the benevolence of Chinese emperor and to establish its suzerainty in maritime trade rather than to establish the permanent position on land. The political dynamics at home caused the rise and fall of the maritime might of China. The famous explorer, Zheng He’s expeditions represented China’s ambition to expand its control over the Indian Ocean regions. The Malabar Coast with its geographical advantages had developed maritime activities enhancing its commercial fortunes. China had to accept the strength of Malabar kingdoms in terms of political power, trade and commercial advantages. Importantly, Malabar kingdoms did not accept the Chinese assertions of supremacy but engaged with the Chinese on equal terms. An attempt is made here to trace China’s maritime strategy to expand their power beyond the immediate periphery and establish its supremacy in the Indian Ocean.

Fighting against climate change and for fair trade: finding the EU\u2019s interest in the solar panels dispute with China

The dispute between the EU and China regarding the trade in solar panels has been commonly explained in terms of power politics, whereby a mercantile China exploited European internal divisions to its advantage. But the trade defence case was also criticized for running against European climate policy goals. To which extent does this case illustrate a normative conflict between trade and the environment? The article replaces the dispute in the context of the trade defence procedures, according to which the EU had to decide, first, whether China’s subsidization of its PV industry was illegal, and second, whether Europe’s climate policies warranted against imposing trade defence duties. It finds that, in this case, the familiar competition between divergent European industrial interests was made worse by an important normative cleavage amongst European decision-makers, regarding the appropriate way to achieve global climate change policy goals. Simply applying the law did not settle the dispute. Instead, it plastered a political compromise emerged from a shift in the political narrative of the dispute, from emphasizing competition to emphasizing interdependence, pushing the Commission into a political compromise with China.

Postcolonialism and World Literature

The disciplinary fields of postcolonialism and world literature are currently engaged in some sharp exchanges over the global study of literature. With Mia Couto and Assia Djebar as its test cases, this essay assesses and expands the debate. While postcolonial and world literature scholars clearly share some common ground, misunderstandings as well as disagreements prevail. More importantly, however, there are evident disciplinary blind spots on both sides that call for a combination of methodologies to account for literature as grounded in local, conflictual histories and as a circulational phenomenon that moves across languages and literary fields. Insofar as literature is a globally transportable institution, it cannot be understood exclusively in terms of political power and domination, but also as a world of its own and an enabling alternative to other domains of power. Conversely, the essay argues, given the tensions between their subjective position and the transnational valency of literature, writers from colonies and postcolonies are of specific and paradigmatic importance to the theorization of world literature.

From logics to procedures: arguing within international environmental negotiations

Mainstream literature in international relations understands negotiations in terms of power politics and/or bargaining processes between rival national interests to account for states’ negotiating stands. Using definitions and questions initially defined by Thomas Risse, this study of processes at work in the biodiversity regime underlines instead their deliberative dimension and its contribution to positive negotiation outcomes. However, the article also challenges the dominant understanding of deliberation in global environmental politics that focuses on the participation of non-governmental organizations and other interest groups in the ‘public space’. Instead it identifies deliberative elements in the negotiation process proper, stressing in particular the importance of the relationships developed between governmental delegations through series of closed meetings of selected participants. This contribution uses for illustration the negotiations leading to the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety and to the Nagoya Protocol on Access to Genetic Resources and the Fair and Equitable Sharing of Benefits Arising from their Utilization.

Political Rivals and Regional Leaders: Dual Identities and Sino-Japanese Relations within East Asian Cooperation

This article argues that the dual identities of political rivals and regional leaders have been of critical importance in determining China and Japan’s regional policies and their bilateral relations within East Asian cooperation. China and Japan, in identifying each other as political rivals rather than cooperative partners, have defined their interests in regional cooperative projects, particularly those led by the other party, in terms of power politics. At the same time, China and Japan’s efforts to gain followers’ acceptance of their aspired leadership identities have shaped their regional policy options and behaviours. The combination effects of these dual identities have produced variances in China and Japan’s regional policies and their bilateral relations within East Asian financial and institutional cooperation. Particularly with regards to regional projects led by the other party and supported by a majority of followers, China and Japan cooperated with the intention of neutralizing the other’s dominance in the region and to demonstrate the responsibilities one should assume as aspirant regional leader. China or Japan opposed, in terms of power politics, cooperative projects the other party initiated that did not secure majority support among followers, instead promoting their own initiatives to expand followers’ acceptance of their leadership.

Colonization in South Texas: fences, heterotopias and emplacements

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to describe the taking of land from American citizens, mostly Latinos, and the public policies by the national government that gives it the power to override all federal, state, and local laws. Previous laws were established to protect property owners. Environmental regulations were designed to prevent the erosion of unique ecosystems in the USA. The legal ability to use such power has allowed the DHS secretary to effectively strip economically poor and politically powerless citizens of their personal property and to force wildlife refuges to surrender their holdings in order to build the fence.Design/methodology/approach – The author explains what this all means in terms of political power using primarily the work of Herbert Marcuse on power and repression and Michel Foucault and his concepts of heterotopias, and emplacement.Findings – The idea is to provide the means and build upon Marcuse's and Foucault's works to better understand and build public administration ...

PROTOCOL: Farmer Field Schools for Improving Farming Practices and Farmer Outcomes in Low‐ and Middle‐income Countries: A Systematic Review

Farmer field schools (FFS) are a common approach used to transfer specialist knowledge, promote skills and empower farmers around the world. At least 10 million farmers in 90 countries have attended such schools. FFS are implemented by facilitators using participatory "discovery-based" learning based on adult education principles. Many different implementing bodies have been involved. Field schools have a range of objectives, including tackling overuse of pesticides and other harmful practices, improving agricultural and environmental outcomes, and empowering disadvantaged farmers such as women. We conducted a systematic review of evidence on FFS implementation to investigate whether FFS make a difference, to which farmers, and why or why not. We synthesised quantitative evidence on intervention effects using statistical meta-analysis, and qualitative evidence on the barriers and enablers of effectiveness using a theory of change framework. The results of statistical meta-analysis provide evidence that FFS are beneficial in improving intermediate outcomes relating to knowledge learned and adoption of beneficial practices, as well as final outcomes relating to agricultural production and farmers' incomes. The findings suggest this to be the case for FFS promoting integrated pest management (IPM) technology, as well as other techniques. However, the rigorous impact evaluation evidence base is small and there are no studies that we were able to identify as having a low risk of bias. There is no evidence that neighbouring non-participant farmers benefit from diffusion of IPM knowledge from FFS participants. Therefore, they do not experience improvements in IPM adoption and agriculture outcomes. The evidence of positive effects on agricultural outcomes is largely limited to short-term evaluations of pilot programmes. In the few examples where FFS have been scaled up, the evidence does not suggest they have been effective in improving agricultural outcomes among participating farmers or neighbouring non-participants. Although empowerment is a major objective of many FFS, very few studies have collected information on this outcome in a rigorous manner. A few studies suggest farmers feel greater self-confidence. What explains the lack of scalable effects among FFS participants, or diffusion of IPM practices among the community? FFS differ from standard agricultural extension interventions, which tend to focus on disseminating knowledge of more simple practices such as application of fertiliser and pesticides, or adoption of improved seeds. The experiential nature of the training, and the need for the benefits of the FFS technology to be observed, are barriers to spontaneous diffusion. Furthermore, the effectiveness of scaled-up interventions has been hampered by problems in recruiting and training appropriate facilitators at scale. The review provides implications for policy, practice and research.

Die steirischen Erbhuldigungen

The paper deals with the homage of the ‘Steirische Landstaende’ – the representatives of the different estates – to theArchdukes of the Habsburg hereditary lands as a legal act. It examines how the act developed into the main mode oflegitimizing any kind of rule in the Early Modern Period. Also it focuses on the fundamental importance of the ‘alteHerkommen’ (old customs). The act of the representatives’ homage to the Archduke regularly was a focal point ofdifferent interests in terms of power-politics. Based on an overview of the Styrian homages’ development and thespecial case of the homage to Archduke Leopold I. in 1660 the paper tries to examine the decrease of the homages’importance and function in the Styrian dominions.

The Shanghai Cooperation Organization, trade, and the roles of Iran, India and Pakistan

ABSTRACT This article seeks to explore the implications of Shanghai Cooperation Organization's (SCO) engagement with India, Pakistan and Iran. Not in terms of power-politics or as a counterbalance to the USA as this has been explored elsewhere, but what practical problems such an expanded organization could help solve, what opportunities it could realize, and how SCO's engagement in trade is a function of favourable political and bilateral developments in the region. It is argued here that the trade, infrastructure and energy sectors are of particular importance and that substantial potential gains could be realized if coordination is improved. Nevertheless, it is also recognized that China, Russia, Pakistan, India and Iran may have lower standards of democratic development and economic transparency than the West. What is the motivation behind the SCO's engagement with India, Pakistan and Iran? Should this engagement be conceived only in terms of balancing US unipolarity or are there legitimate concerns of increasing regional cooperation in Eurasia?

Conceptions of curriculum: A framework for understanding New Zealand’s curriculum framework and teachers’ opinions

Abstract Five conceptions of curriculum (i.e., humanist, social reconstructionist, skills, technological, and academic) are described and used to analyse the New Zealand Curriculum Framework. It is argued that the framework contains aspects of five conceptions, despite their apparent contradictory nature. The conceptions were used in a study of 235 primary school teachers' opinions as to the nature of curriculum. Teachers were found to be mostly in agreement with the humanist conception, while giving moderate agreement to the technological and academic conceptions. Nonetheless, they still gave slight agreement with the social reconstructionist conception. Use of the conceptions will enhance understanding of current curriculum debates and pressures. ********** The publishing of Curriculum Matters indicates that there is a growing interest in issues to do with curriculum. New Zealand embarked on a major and contested reform of its school curriculum in the early 1990s, and has recently undertaken a stocktake of those reforms. The stocktake has suggested somewhat minor revisions, while proposals to completely restructure the official curriculum are being floated (Rutherford, 2005). appears missing in the work to do with drafting, reviewing, publishing, implementing, and evaluating the official curriculum, is a framework by which the nature of curriculum can be understood. I propose in this paper is to outline a framework by which curriculum can be understood, and report two studies that make use of that framework in analysing the curriculum and interpreting teachers' opinions of curriculum. Most generally, curriculum has to do with the answers to such commonplace questions as What can and should be taught to whom, when, and how? (Eisner & Vallance, 1974). As Begg (2005, p. 6) puts it, curriculum is all planning for the classroom. There are several ways that curriculum can be understood: one approach interprets curriculum primarily in terms of political power (e.g., curriculum as a fact, as practice, or as social conflict, in Goodson, 1995), while a second analyses the nature of what is taught (e.g., curriculum as race, gender, aesthetic, institutionalised, or poststructuralist texts, in Pinar, Reynolds, Slattery, & Taubman, 1995). The approach I advocate examines the naive or layperson notions that teachers--who are not curriculum specialists or theorists--have about what they think the stuff is that they are teaching. Defining what should be in curriculum plans for the classroom requires answering two questions: (1) Who should determine what is taught?; and (2) material should be taught? It would appear that there are a limited number of options available to curriculum developers in answering these questions. Who determines the curriculum can only be one or more of the following: (a) students' needs or wants; (b) teachers' knowledge and expertise; or (c) government's policies in response to society's problems or issues. The options for determining the substance of curriculum relates to either (a) important content, such as the chemical make-up of water, or (b) important processes, such as knowing how to learn. Many studies have explored how teachers conceive of various subjects, including mathematics, English, reading, language, history, and social studies (Calderhead, 1996; Clark & Peterson, 1986; Thompson, 1992). These studies have shown that teachers develop a subject understanding that is broad and deep, enabling them to facilitate the building of similar connections in the minds of others (Calderhead, 1996, p. 716). They have also shown that the way teachers understand their subject affects the way they teach and assess. However, primary school teachers are generalists charged with responsibility for teaching subjects--therefore, it is appropriate to examine how they conceive of curriculum, rather than just subjects. A second reason for looking at curriculum, rather than subjects, is that most teachers are not just delivery mechanisms or conduits for curriculum; but rather they are creators or makers of curriculum (Clandinin & Connelly, 1992). …

Folkelige og sociale bevægelser. Nyere forskningsretninger og kvalitative forståelser

Folkelige og sociale bevægelser. Nyere forskningsretninger og kvalitative forståelser

Asian values and its political consequences: Is Cambodia the first domino?

The coincidence of the ‘third wave of democratization’ and the vanishing Cold War seemed in the early 1990s to pave the way for a global democratization. But there are pockets of resistance and backlashes. Southeast Asia has been labelled as the region in the world most resilient to democracy. The Southeast Asian challenge to liberal democracy has been articulated as an ideology superior to liberal democracy, often labelled ‘Asian Values’. The debate on Asian Values has now been going on for a number of years and while it initially was merely mused over in non‐Asian environments, it is a definite possibility that real political consequences are emerging. The political violence in Cambodia is in this article utilized as a test case on whether the high tolerance towards authoritarianism among the ASEAN countries has paved the way for Cambodia returning to authoritarianism. Was the power grab in Cambodia the first in a second wave of authoritarianism in Asia? On a structural level, circumstances abound that the events of 5–6 July 1997 in Cambodia are related to an authoritarian build‐up in the Pacific Asia. The relationship between a general acceptance of soft authoritarianism in Southeast Asia and the current development in Cambodia is too important to be ignored. The focus is on two partly related possible connections between Asian Values and Cambodian politics, collected under the headings of ‘In search for a political programme’ and ‘Regional responses?’. We try to establish the structural reliance from the side of Cambodia vis‐à‐vis the East Asian region in general and ASEAN in particular, both in terms of power politics and in terms of political ideas.

The Scythe of Saturn: Shakespeare and Magical Thinking by Linda Woodbridge

N OTES 1 Sexual Anarchy: Gender and Culture at the Fin de Siècle (New York: Viking, 1990), 4. 2 Michael Warner, Fear of a Queer Planet: Queer Politics and Social Theory (Min­ neapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1993), xxvi. e r ic sav o y / University of Calgary Linda Woodbridge, The Scythe of Saturn: Shakespeare and Magical Thinking (Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1994). ii, 390. $47.50 US cloth, $17.95 US paper. This is not another book on black magic, white magic, or hermetic magic; on John Dee, Prospero, and the witches of Macbeth. Linda Woodbridge, as she makes clear, is writing not about magic but about magical thinking: a fundamental habit of belief, associated with the popular imagination but not confined to it, that evolves systems of threat and protection concerning the body, the land, and the seasons. It is the sort of belief that surfaces in the fear of the evil eye, the fear that praise will bring disaster, the hope that reading scripture in the fields will be good for the crops. In Shakespeare’s time it existed side by side with the new rationalism of the Renaissance, and, as she amply demonstrates, his imagination drew on both; so much so that the exact degree of his belief or disbelief can be hard to determine. She also produces some disconcerting examples to show that magical thinking has not died out in our own time: the protests against the channel tunnel, for example, have roots in the ancient fear of contamination through the entry of foreign matter into the body, a fear that led the Elizabethans to mistrust bathing because it opened the pores and made the body vulnerable to plague. Woodbridge’s treatment of her theme is lively, informative, and firmly di­ rected. She demonstrates that links we might think of as literary analogies are embedded deep in Shakespeare’s culture. Though she presents a rich col­ lection of folk beliefs, and her enjoyment of them is infectious, this is not a soft-centred, nostalgic tribute to quaint old folk-ways but a rigorous and well documented examination of a whole mentality. It is also a necessary correc­ tive to some of the narrower habits of thought in contemporary Shakespeare criticism: the materialist tendency to see him demystifying and ironizing the beliefs of his time, the new historicist tendency to see everything in terms of political power. Shakespeare’s concern with the threat of invasion, for example, is recognizably linked with the current political situation of Eng­ land; but when the threat to a land is linked with threats to a house, and to a woman’s body, something more than politics is at work. Woodbridge 364 demonstrates these links effectively in discussions of Titus Andronicus, Lucrece , and Cymbeline. Critics usually see a psychological or political basis for Coriolanus’s intense dislike of praise, and this may be part of the truth; but another part, Woodbridge suggests, is the ancient belief that excessive praise will incur the wrath of the gods. The same factor is at work when Collatine’s praise of Lucrece leads to her rape. The banishment of enemies and the demonizing of foreigners (especially the French) in the history plays show a need to deal with one’s own corrup­ tion by transferring it on to someone else — the need, in other words, to find a scapegoat. (There are other modern analogies here, in our tendency to blame everything on the government, and our belief that we can deal with the evils of life by sueing somebody.) The political conflicts of the history plays can also be linked to the generational conflict embodied in the seasons, as age and winter are driven out by youth and spring. But this does not always work in a simple way: the Renaissance, though it recognized no mid­ dle ground between youth and age, did recognize hybrids: the aged virgin (Queen Elizabeth), the child with the wisdom of an old man (Octavius). In Antony and Cleopatra “sexuality and fertility ... attach to the ‘aged’ couple and its youth is a killjoy, almost (in his opposition to the union of Antony and Cleopatra) a young...